Music
UK dancehall: an oral history
The Ragga Twins, Tippa Irie, Top Cat, Sticky, Stush and more trace the winding path of British dancehall – from humble sound system beginnings to its current place at the heart of mainstream UK pop.
When the Windrush Generation first arrived on the shores of Great Britain on the HMS Empire Windrush in 1948, they brought with a music that wouldn’t just leave an imprint on British music culture, but over time would completely alter its DNA.
The calypso sounds introduced to the country by the likes of Lord Kitchener and Lord Beginner would lay down deep roots – and in the years following, younger musicians descended from the Windrush Generation would look back towards Jamaica, taking the sounds and styles of the island and giving them a distinct UK spin. Arguably, no Jamaican style has travelled as well as dancehall – the upfront, riddim-driven sound that emerged from the island in the late '70s and early '80s. In particular, it found a huge audience in the UK.
We sat down with some of the figureheads and innovators of UK dancehall to tell the story of the sound's evolution on these shores. First, pioneers like Sweetie Irie and Ragga Twins talk about the Jamaican dancehall sound's arrival in the UK. Then, Top Cat, Richard 'Sticky' Forbes, Stush and Maxwell D explain how dancehall became a vital component of UK-born genres like jungle and garage. And finally, we meet the latest generation of artists – including Alicai Harley, J Kaz and Big Zeeks – who are writing UK dancehall's next chapter.
1980s: Dancehall Beginnings
At the dawn of the 1980s, much of the dancehall heard in the UK was coming straight from Jamaica. But increasingly, a generation of homegrown artists like Tippa Irie and Ragga Twins started practicing the style, taking their sound systems out on the road.
Tippa Irie photographed in Brixton, 1985
© David Corio/Redferns
Tippa Irie: My father had a sound system called Musical Messiah and I learnt my trade with him on his sound, listening to Big Youth, Dillinger, Dennis Alcapone and many more. My mother and father wanted me to be a lawyer or doctor, like most parents. Then my dad left and went to Jamaica and my mum found me a job as a plasterer and a labourer. It was then she realised my talent and encouraged me to do music as well as a day job. Then the music took over. I saw I could make a living out of it.
Flinty, Ragga Twins: [Fellow Ragga Twin] Deman Rockers got his start into the dancehall scene by just getting on the mic at dances where and whenever he could. We then built our own sound system and played out at our own parties. There were loads of artists from Jamaica and UK who we looked to for inspiration at the time: Big Youth, Michigan & Smiley, Johnny Ringo, Yellowman, Papa Toyan. I remember listening to the great U-Roy and Dennis Alcapone, trying to imitate them and my family laughing at me. Then they realise I was getting good and they introduce me to King Tubby’s sound from Brixton. Although we had our own sound system with Unity Sound, we used to play with Saxon at Notting Hill Carnival – and we’re still there today after all these years.
Top Cat: I was 14 years old when I first started working on a sound system called Sledge Hamma from my local area. I lifted sound boxes to get into the dance for free and would MC on the mic at the beginning of dances to warm the dance up. I also used to MC on the sound at our local youth centre called St Mary's Centre in Ladywell, south London as practice every week between 7pm and 11pm.
Sweetie Irie: When I first started, everyone was behind the sound system. But we started to be as part of the performance, there was a change in the guard. A lot of the pop acts were doing big shows and I felt like we could do the same. It was commercial, but there was always that reggae DNA in it.
Flinty, Ragga Twins: Soon we were going all over the country. Sound system culture was everywhere. The most memorable moment was when we played with Kilimanjaro in Slough Community Center, with over 1,500 people in attendance.
Ragga Twins
© Martyn Goodacre/Hulton Archive
1990s: The Sound Evolves
UK artists began to distinguish themselves from the Jamaican scene, blending dancehall with distinct new UK styles. Artists like Glamma Kid put a commercial spin on the ragga sound coming from Jamaican artists like Bounty Killer and Beenie Man, while Top Cat became an early voice of jungle – at first through unauthorised remixes, later through seminal tracks of his own.
Sticky: I used to listen to Radio London on a Sunday in the ‘80s – that was the moment when the transition from bands to electronic began. You’d hear guys like Rodigan and Yellowman – they were the people I was listening to. It was still reggae at that point, but the next stage was the digital reggae. To hear this electronic sound was exciting.
Top Cat: By the '90s we were using electronic sounds and dancehall had become less about the bands and more about the MC. My track Love Me Ses was the beginning of the jungle hype that started and that transition from reggae. There were a lot of bootleg remixes of that riddim, which is part of the reason I started my own label, 9 Lives Records. In 1993 I dropped a reggae and jungle version of Push Up Yuh Lighter. The elders weren't too sure of it, I remember – it was too hard and fast compared to what was coming out during the '80s. But the technology had changed.
Top Cat live with The Heatwave, 2017
© Eisa Bakos
Glamma Kid: When I arrived in the dancehall scene, I was already a selector for the youth sound system Glamour Guard. In 1996, I dropped my first single Fashion 98, which was later re-released and went to No. 49 on the charts. I developed my own sound style around 1997 or 1998, which was a little bit more commercial as I was appearing on BBC Radio 1 with Tim Westwood at the time. Bounty Killer, Beenie Man and Buju Banton had already blown up by the time I came on the scene and they were the major influences on my sound. They paved the way for artists like me.
Sticky: I started playing reggae at Poison, [a club] in Croydon in 1991 but they knew me as a hip-hop boy because of the way I dressed. One of my mates asked if I could play at his dance but I didn’t know it would be reggae. I was 18 at the time but I was mixing it like it was hip-hop, using two turntables. Then I started a show, Ill Kids, when I was at Choice FM and I brought the dancehall sound to it. In 1996, I started producing but there wasn’t anywhere to produce hip-hop – there were a few places but there weren’t many studios I could go to apart from reggae studios.
The first guy I met was Mark Elliot, Maxi Priest’s brother. He gave me an opportunity to produce in his studio, so I learnt from a reggae perspective. I went to Jamaica in 1997 and was staying with Freddie McGregor. I met Cleveland Brownie and all his brothers including Red Rat, Cutty Ranks. I saw how they made songs and watched them write. I loved how they made music there – they’d write the song first and then make the beat, which I wasn’t used to.
Maxwell D: My dad was DJ Natty B, a prominent dancehall DJ – he was on WMK and Kiss FM. I grew up on that sound in the early ‘80s and sometimes I’d perform at some of his shows. I used to rave to drum’n’bass and jungle a lot when I was younger, because that was the sound growing at the time. I could spit to dancehall but those two were really my sounds. But by the time I came out of prison, garage was the banging sound. I was a big fan of Stevie Hyper D – he was the OG of the scene. But I knew that I could tear up the rave as well.
Sticky: When I got back from Jamaica in ‘98, two-step turned up and I liked the sound of it. Richie Dan on a garage tune was what I wanted I hear, but I wasn’t a garage head at the time.
Stush: Growing up in a family setting, my uncle had a sound system. I remember being in community halls with a big sound system. But coming into the 2000s, there weren’t many in the UK making straight dancehall. There was a feeling that UK artists couldn’t make dancehall – that was the general consensus. Garage was something I fell into.
Ms Dynamite
© Dan Wilton
Ms Dynamite sounded like a machine gun when she spat
Sticky: Our thing was if anyone wanted to get on mic, let them. This girl wanted to come to the rave one time and spit, and she tore it down. This was still in ‘98, her name was Lady Dynamite and she was only 17. For two years, I didn’t know how to get hold of her. But I was working at this record shop in Croydon and I met this A&R called Jade. We were working with this girl group – they weren’t that good and she brought in this girl called Ms Dynamite from Camden to join them. Then it all clicked. I told everyone I met her two years ago and she was fire. We brought her down to perform in south one day. When she started spitting the whole place went crazy. The engineer spoke up, and said she couldn’t be in the group – and they don’t usually speak up and say those sorts of things. That was only because she was that good.
2000s: The UKG Years
By the early 2000s, UK garage was in the ascendant. It was a patchwork of influences – US garage, jungle, soul – but a core part of the sound was dancehall, and many artists jumped on the sound. Ms Dynamite's Booo! – which hit No.12 in 2001 – was a shining example of the dancehall/garage crossover.
Sticky: I told Ms Dynamite she sounded like a machine gun when she spat, and she came back with a poetic take on what I thought her voice was like – which became Booo! Booo! was a garage riddim, but without a hook. I made a beat for her afterwards – that’s what I learned from my time in Jamaica. Without Booo!, Dynamite wouldn’t have got signed. Every other car was playing Booo! It was sold out everywhere. Record shops had signs in the window saying they had no more copies left. There were man in Dixons playing it in store because the bass sounded so good on hi-fi systems.
Stush: The first garage tune I heard was Booo! by Ms. Dynamite and I thought it was sick but I couldn’t describe the sound because I didn’t know what it was. A few years later I met up with Sticky and it was mad because his brother was close friends with mine. I told him that I want to do dancehall because that’s what I loved. He told me that doing dancehall as a UK artist wouldn't really work, but that Booo! basically came from [King Jammy's '80s dancehall production] Punani Riddim. That’s how jungle was too – you'd take the dancehall influences from Jamaica and turn it into a UK thing. Artists like myself, Dynamite, Tubby T and Richie Dan brought influences from dancehall and put them on this UK sound, with that hard bassline.
Maxwell D: When I came out of prison, I went to Rinse FM with Nikki Slimting and we were playing regularly at the Orange Club. That was the place in the ‘90s but I remember people going there before me too. I used go to college with Wiley and DJ Target, but Pay As You Go Cartel didn’t really become official until the 2000s. I jumped into UK funky for a bit as well, and that was a good moment too, particularly around 2008.
Stush: The garage scene was more flashy, everyone dressed up. It was very braggadocious. The guys would be stood around with their big bottles of drink and girls wearing high heels – which is funny because everyone’s wearing trainers. It’s the same in dancehall. You’d put your best clothes on when going out.
Sweetie Irie: I saw [the move into UK garage] as progression, and natural – considering the impact electronic sounds had on reggae by that point. We did a tune with Gorillaz – Clint Eastwood [Sweetie appeared on the 2001 remix by Ed Case]. It went massive and it showed us that we could do this garage thing on a bigger stage.
Stush: The youngers were coming in and changing the sound and some of the elders didn’t really like it. You have those people who are die hard and want to hold onto that original sound. But a few elders embraced me and though it was cool that I had this rough and tough style. At my first rave I met Major Ace, Wiley and Creed and they took me under their wing. There weren’t many women in garage actually spitting, only really me and Dynamite at the time – and Kele and Shola but they were on the R&B side of it, so I didn’t bump into them until a bit later. It was the energy that I loved, jumping on stage and meeting the other MCs, it was a good time out.
Sticky: I met Gabriel [of The Heatwave] in 2008. He’d started a club night called Hot Wuk and it was every Thursday. I ended up playing there every week for free because I loved it. With my endorsement, it went from 50 people to 150. We went around the world and helped to establish the night. Fast forward 10 years, we’re here now.
2010s: Dancehall’s New Gen
Alicai Harley at Notting Hill Carnival, 2018
© Fanatic
The internet has now become the primary destination for music listening and despite the dancehall sound fundamentally relying on an offline presence in the raves, cross-pollination with parallel sounds like afrobeats, grime and UK rap has seen dancehall find its way to the upper echelons of the charts.
Mr. Williamz: Technology and the internet have brought in big changes in the dancehall scene. Once upon a time, you would’ve had to really work in a different way. You can develop your own following before you sign with a reputable label or producer. It’s faster these days, everything gets faster.
Gabriel, The Heatwave: I remember a few years ago when grime was dominant thinking that we had maybe seen the last of British MCs who would spit in patois, as everyone seemed taken with a more distinctly UK accent and flow. But there's been an explosion of new artists since then chatting dancehall style – Stefflon Don, Alicai Harley, K More, Culan, Nadia Rose, Big Zeeks, IQ, Lisa Mercedez, Levi, The RaRa, Trillary Banks, Lady Lykez – as well as more established artists using patois more in their music: Wiley, Wretch 32, Lady Leshurr, P Money, Chip. Plus there's the huge dancehall influence in afro-bashment, afro-swing and afro-wave.
J Kaz: I think the scene has grown so much. The best thing is that no one sounds like anyone else. I have my own sound, Big Zeeks has his own sound and Alicai Harley has her own sound. The diversity between everyone in the scene’s style and approach is what is helping the genre to push forward. The fact that all of us are getting featured on platforms like Red Bull and on commercial radio and in the nightclubs is crazy. The maddest thing is that this is only the start.
Mr. Williamz: My ting is the original style works in different arenas – rub-a-dub, ragga, dancehall, jungle, sound system and all the likkle subgenres. My style fits across the board and everything starts with the sound system when you’re talking about dancehall. When we get invited by a sound system around the world, you see how it’s being expressed differently. Go to Israel and the young kids are playing reggae music from the ‘70s. You see the impact at different levels. Not just through YouTube, the internet and TV but you see it on the ground – the people around the sound system.
Trillary Banks: When I did Come Over Mi Yard and saw how it was received, that let me know UK dancehall really was on the rise. A lot of people don’t know I’m half Jamaican, so for there not to be bare comments like, ‘Who is she trying to be?’ ‘Was she even born there?’ There wasn’t hate around it, how I thought it might have been. Fans really feel me on the dancehall vibe.
Alicai Harley: The way I write music is exactly how I talk. So where the whole twang comes in, is the same way I might chip into my Jamaican accent here and there. I have a really raw delivery in my lyrics that can come across a bit mandem or more dominant, but again that’s because that’s the way I actually talk in real life.
Big Zeeks: A lot has changed, especially with the crossover sounds like afrobeats – and we’ve seen the influence reggae has had on chart music. Everywhere in the world people listen to dancehall so there’s so many influences in the modern sounds. We’ve made a strong dancehall scene here, we’re breaking down doors.
Mr. Williamz: One of the big moments for me was performing with Shinehead. For me, as a yute who grew up listening to his sound and when I approached him, he already knew who I was. Another time was when I was performing at Jamrock a few years ago and Supercat and Damian Marley joined me on stage and we spit some bars together. That was a moment that stayed with me forever – like New Years, your birthday and Christmas at the same time.
Top Cat: When I first started in the dancehall scene every sound had their own MC – mic comperes who would entertain the audience with live performances. In some cases, an MC could compere and MC all night for hours. The scene has changed now. It's more about playing records than it is about the live element. The live element has become a stage show segment for an hour or so. This is good for those who establish themselves as recording artists, but it can hinder how they learn the live aspect of dancehall, depending on if they combine the two. On the plus side, recording artists are moving advanced in the way they present their songs. It's an evolution.
Gabriel, The Heatwave: Stylo G has an international dancehall hit featuring Vybz Kartel and Nicki Minaj that is huge in Jamaica and the US. When was the last time a UK artist could say that?
Sweetie Irie: Garage, grime, jungle – reggae is the tree from which all of those scenes have grown. That’s the beauty of living in the UK – we have all of these influences, so crossing over is normal.